Gigya Data Reveals Disparity Between Social Login and Sharing Activity

Facebook is still the dominant provider of social logins and shared content but other networks are gaining favor as users seek variety in their social activity.

Facebook is still the dominant provider of social logins and shared content but other networks are gaining favor as users seek variety in their social activity.

According to new data from social media tools provider, Gigya, Facebook commands 52 percent of all social logins and 50 percent of all shared content. Gigya surveyed its pool of brand clients during the last quarter and found that Google is making notable gains as a social login provider, doubling from 12 percent to 24 percent of all social login activity on their respective sites.

“We’re still seeing Facebook remain as the dominant login provider but Google is clearly making headway,” notes John Eklaim, vice president of marketing at Gigya.

“With the advent of Google+ sign-in, we believe that this trend will continue particularly because of the mobile over-the-air download features offered with Google+ sign-in,” he adds.

Facebook’s position as a social login provider is even more profound among sites managed by education and non-profit organizations, online retailers, consumer brands, and travel and hospitality properties. Facebook was the go-to login provider for 81 percent of education and non-profit sites, 79 percent at online retailers, 67 percent of consumer brands and 57 percent of all travel and hospitality sites that use Gigya for social connectivity.

Media outlets and publishers bring in the most choice with Google+ and Yahoo attracting a respective 28 percent and 21 percent of login activity to Facebook’s 44 percent.

“Facebook’s share-of-logins in e-commerce was also somewhat surprising, especially compared to many other industries, but we also could see that change with the entrance of Amazon into the authentication space,” says Elkaim.

The disparity that Gigya found between social logins and sharing reinforces the highly competitive landscape of social. There certainly is room and an appetite among users for multiple tools and social media providers that excel at different functions.

While Google+ is growing as a login provider, it is rarely used for social sharing. The company captures only 2 percent of all content shared among sites that use Gigya’s tools. Twitter, on the other hand, shines as a social sharing tool, providing 24 percent of all activity and coming closest to Facebook’s 50 percent among all providers.

“Users see networks like Facebook and Google+ as identity networks whereas Twitter is really about syndication and that falls in line with the essence of what those networks offer,” comments Elkaim.

“Facebook and Google+ offer pretty robust profiles but that’s not really what Twitter was designed for. Rather, the focus is on constant sharing, not as heavily tied to identity,” he says.

Online retailer sharing is Pinterest’s game now. The network provided the most shares in the e-commerce category with 41 percent, compared to 37 percent for Facebook and 17 percent for Twitter. Pinterest is also strong among travel and hospitality sites, following behind Facebook’s 58 percent with 19 percent of all shared content.

“Pinterest’s sweet spot really is in e-commerce. Pinterest users tend to pin items that they want to purchase later or that they’ve already purchased. A number of Gigya ecommerce clients cater to largely female audiences, and so does Pinterest, which could be one reason why Pinterest has such a heavy presence in e-commerce sharing,” Elkaim says.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Matt Kapko has been writing about mobile since 2006, before it became cool. Based in Long Beach, CA, he has covered mobile entertainment, digital media, marketing, and advertising for several business media outlets. A former editor and reporter for RCR Wireless News, paidContent, and iMedia Connection, Matt is a regular freelance reporter for ClickZ. You can follow Matt on Twitter at @MattKapko or drop him a line at matt@kapko.co.

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